Ninde language

Ninde
Region	Malekula, Vanuatu
Native speakers	1,100 (2001)
Language family	Austronesian Malayo-Polynesian Oceanic Southern Oceanic North Vanuatu Malekula Interior Ninde
Writing system	Latin script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mwi
Glottolog	labo1244

Ninde, or Labo (also Nide, Meaun, Mewun) is an Oceanic language spoken by about 1,100 people in the Southwest Bay area of Malekula island, in Vanuatu.

One unusual feature is that it has both a voiced and a voiceless bilabial trill.

In popular culture

In an episode of the British television programme An Idiot Abroad, Karl Pilkington meets the son of the chief, who comments upon the Ninde language. He explains that “all the words of Ninde begin with /n/”, such as the word nimdimdip for palm tree, naho for fruit, or nuhuli for leaf. They then visit the grave of a woman who was named Nicola.

However, this general statement is actually not true. The only words of Ninde that start with /n/ are the inanimate common nouns of the language; the /n/ reflects an old nominal article which has been fused to the radical of these common nouns. As for the name Nicola, which is a borrowed European name, it cannot be taken as representative of the Ninde language.

References

• Lynch, John and Crowley, Terry. 2001. Languages of Vanuatu: A New Survey and Bibliography. Pacific Linguistics. Canberra: Australian National University.